A novel demountable shear connector for precast steel‐concrete composite bridges is presented. The connector uses high‐strength steel bolts, which are fastened to the top flange of the steel beam with the aid of a special locking nut configuration that prevents slip of bolts within their holes. Moreover, the connector promotes accelerated construction and overcomes typical construction tolerances issues of precast structures. Most importantly, the connector allows bridge disassembly, and therefore, can address different bridge deterioration scenarios with minimum disturbance to traffic flow, i.e. (i) precast deck panels can be rapidly uplifted and replaced; (ii) connectors can be rapidly removed and replaced; and (iii) steel beams can b

The experiment was conducted to study the effect of leaves extract of Salvia sclarea , Rosmarinus officinalis and Thymus vulgaris with 10% and 30% concentration on germination of seeds and growth of seedlings . The effect of these extracts on infection percentage of seeds decay and surface growth of Rhizoctonia solani . The results showed that the three extracts effected significantly to reduced percentage of seeds germination, acceleration of germination , promoter indicator , infection percentage of seeds decay and surface growth of R. solani especially in 30% concentration .

There are many aims of this book: The first aim is to develop a model equation that describes the spread of contamination through soils which can be used to determine the rate of environmental contamination by estimate the concentration of heavy metals (HMs) in soil. The developed model equation can be considered as a good representation for a problem of environmental contamination. The second aim of this work is to design two feed forward neural networks (FFNN) as an alternative accurate technique to determine the rate of environmental contamination which can be used to solve the model equation. The first network is to simulate the soil parameters which can be used as input data in the second suggested network, while the second network sim

This study has contributed to identify convenience of the land Usifiya of Mahmudiya district baghdad province for the cultivation of sensitive and salt resisting crops and growing pasture .The nine pedons (tracks) of the study have spread over three transects to cover the whole area the north, middle and south .
Depending on Visual Space tupe (TM) for 2007 which is super classified, samples are distributed on all classes of land cover
It is detected the presence of nine series soils namely
MM5- MW96- DM 115 for 1st transect
MF12- DM46 - DM96 for 2nd transect
DM56- DF56 - MW5 for 3rd transect
Soils are classified to the level of sub great group according to (soil Survey Staff) to :
*Typic Torri Fluvents , Typic Haplos

Water flow into unsaturated porous media is governed by the Richards’ partial differential equation expressing the mass conservation and Darcy’s laws. The Richards’ equation may be written in three forms,where the dependent variable is pressure head or moisture content, and the constitutive relationships between water content and pressure head allow for conversion of one form into the other. In the present paper, the “moisture-based" form of Richards’ equation is linearized by applying Kirchhoff’s transformation, which
combines the soil water diffusivity and soil water content. Then the similarity method is used to obtain the analytical solution of wetting front position. This exact solution is obtained by means of Lie’s

Gypseous soil is considered as a problematic soil for embankment construction, however, implementation of emulsified asphalt as a stabilization agent could be a proper solution for enhancing its properties as a subgrade soil. In this work, the sustainability of asphalt stabilized soil has been assessed in terms of its resistance to cyclic (freezing-thawing) and (heating-cooling) processes. Specimens have been prepared at optimum fluid content (moisture and emulsion) and tested under direct shear stresses while subjected to 30 cycles of (freezing-thawing) and (heating-cooling). Both of dry and soaked testing conditions have been implemented. Data have been observed after each 10 cycles, and compared with that of reference mix. It was conclud